China has leapt into top spot in the Far East for Scottish salmon exports – just six months after it allowed seafood to be sent directly from Scotland for the first time. Data from HM Revenue and Customs revealed 2,347 tonnes of salmon were exported to the world’s most populous nation in the first half of 2011.

The Far East total for the period was 3,036 tonnes, worth £16m.

China is now the fifth largest export destination for Scottish salmon.

In January, the Scottish and Chinese governments reached an agreement to allow seafood exports directly from Scotland. The announcement was made when First Minister Alex Salmond met Vice-Premier Li during a visit to Scotland…

The Chinese imposed additional import controls on Norwegian salmon last year in apparent retribution for the Nobel Peace Prize awarded in Oslo to the Chinese dissident, Liu Xiaobo. The result has been a collapse in sales of salmon to China, and the sight and smell of North Sea fish rotting in Chinese warehouses. The Norwegian Foreign Office said overall trade with China had grown by 46 per cent over the past six months. But sales of fresh salmon, meanwhile, have collapsed 61.8 per cent.

Officials said they would not speculate as to why Beijing had ignored trade rules relating to Norwegian salmon. But it seems clear that the threat from the Chinese embassy in Oslo last year, of “damage” to diplomatic ties should the Nobel Prize be handed to “a criminal” has focused on a narrow, iconic target.

The charges against the Scottish first minister have been made by Andrew Flitcroft, editor of Trout and Salmon magazine. “The implications of increasing significantly, let alone doubling, farmed salmon production in Scotland are simply terrifying,” Flitcroft writes. “Surely it is recklessly irresponsible to contemplate any increase without first rectifying the dire existing problems. Marine cages of hundreds of thousands of farmed salmon are breeding grounds for millions of sea lice; these parasites feed on the mucus, tissue and blood of their farmed salmon hosts. The companies employ a range of measures using highly toxic chemicals to combat the lice, in order to reduce the damage and stress caused to their captive hosts. This is the environmental calamity that the salmon farming industry and Scottish government is so determined to deny. And make no mistake, there is no such thing as ‘sustainable’ farmed salmon, no matter what the evocative packaging on the supermarket shelves tries to convey.”

Still, who cares about repression when you can make money from fishy deals…

The enterprising Scots should be able to get a good deal on all that left over Norwegian Salmon, rebadge it and export it to China. Or do the Chinese prefer their salmon with lice? Flied lice.

agw

Fishy indeed.
In the interests of open and transparent international trading, Scottish First Minister Mr Alex Salmond will have very carefully explained to China’s Vice-Premier Li the parent companies of 96 per cent of Scottish commercial salmon farms are?
You guessed it ….Norwegian.
There are… NO commercial Scottish fish farming operations which are not beholden to the Vikings! Kissing Odin’s Ring three times and lifting the kilt will not change that.

Salmond can ask for more sites to be opened – totally knacking the water environment for hard-pressed shellfish catchers – but local councillors are unlikely to comply…especially when local elections are looming.